Some Cool Memories

As with anything bike racing and bike related trips can make for some great memories that will last a lifetime. I took some pictures the other day of some of the items I have currently on display in my house. First up is the pint glass that I got for finishing the Dirty Kanza 200, I thought it showed best full of rock since it was a gravel road race. I also ordered the special edition of XXC magazine and have it on display with the pint glass. I also stuck one of my maps from one of the legs of the race inside the pint glass as well.

Next up is my team Trek VW jersey that is signed by Chris Eatough, who is by far my favorite mountain biker, I felt like a kid when I went up to Chris and asked him for his autograph. It was our first trip (Mark, Tim, and myself) to the Lumberjack 100, there are a ton of memories on this trip alone (what happens at Lumberjack stays at Lumberjack!!!). Starting with the all night drive and traveling through the tail end of a massive storm that hit the race site and left an unimaginable 11 inches of rain. We had to take a detour and still had to drive through water across the road in several places. I remember thinking that we just drove all this way and they are going to cancel this race, to my surprise other than the 200 yds of flooded area we were racing on an almost dry course. Many sections the rain made it faster due to the sandy soil base. After the race we went to the post race festivities and I took along my Trek VW jersey in hopes that I could get Chris to sign it. It's kind of funny because sitting across from Chris was Jeff Schalk (the race winner who also raced for Trek VW) and I bypassed him to ask Chris for his autograph. It may have been nothing but I do remember him kind of looking at me funny, I'm sure he was thinking "Hey, I won this race", but then again Chris is a 6 time World Champion. Do you like the custom made frame? Tim made that for me, he did an awesome job.

This is a a few pictures from Cruise The Blues, this particular year I raced as a team with my Dad, this was his first experience of this kind and we had a lot of fun. He told me later that early on his first lap he was thinking "What did I get myself into?". He rode great and we had a blast and walked away with a 2nd place team finish. I had another 2nd place medal from a solo race the year before so I hung on the frame as well. The year before was a fun trip too, only Mark and I went out West to race that year. We drove out the night before in my truck and I have fork mounts in the bed of the truck, I had laid my front wheel under my bike and even had the thought that I hope my tire doesn't for some reason hit my chain ring....guess what? I did!!! We got up race day morning to the front wheel of my bike flat due to a sidewall cut compliments of my chain ring, I pumped it full of air and tried to get it to seal and it was fine until I put pressure on it. It was entertaining to say the least because it would spray out as if it had a pulse, it would shoot out a foot our so every few seconds (pretty cool to watch). That was the year that Mark took a header onto a big rock and busted open his chin but that wasn't the end of the race for him, he went on to overtake the 4th place rider on the last lap and found himself in the money on the podium. After the awards we packed up and headed to the hospital so he could get some stitches, that is after he harassed the doctor a little bit. We waited a long time in the ER for the doc, turns out he was mowing his grass!!! The doc came in with street clothes on and sandals and had a ring around his ankles from dirt, Mark asked him if he had been racing his bike too!!!

This last pic is from the 2009 Lumberjack 100, I did a little detailed finish work with my finishers patch, it looks great on the wall.

So many riding experiences with friends, I have only mentioned a few here. Of course a couple more that stick out in my mind happened early this year in Oklahoma, there was 8 of us (I think) that drove most of the night and we arrived at the hotel around 4 a.m. We had canceled one of the rooms since we were going to arrive so late and 4 of us slept in the van in the hotel parking lot. Jan came out the next morning and being the silly guy he is looks in the van window and says "Is that a condom?", it was hilarious. Then we had Lake Denny right at the back door of the van!!! Speaking of Denny, his maiden trip on "The Kevinator" will stick in my mind as well. I was off to the side (on the Sally route which changed from the time I was there before, the arrows painted on the rock took you off a 3-4 ft drop...I don't think so) and was watching Denny start the drop in and as he was going through he started bouncing a little bit and then disappeared behind the massive rocks that make this awesome hill. I watched below the rock but he didn't emerge. Turns out he actually had to lay it down and ended up cutting his tire (we had a great view up there while he changed that flat). I have a lot of respect for him because he tried to ride it, that's more than I can say for me!!! And the really cool thing is that there are a ton more still to happen.

24 Hour Of DINO Race Recap

Going into this race I had no idea what to expect since it was my first race of this kind, I knew it was going to be painful but that was about it. Molly and I arrived early in the afternoon on Friday, in fact the course had not been marked yet but that was okay because I hadn't planned on riding the full 13 mile course. Shortly after arriving one of the local riders asked me if I had been there before and I told him no, he said that I would want to see the "Waterfall" on the Cliffside trail because it had a 90 degree drop into a narrow rock shelf with a rock wall on your left and a 50 ft drop on your right, and if they received the rain that was forcasted then this was going to be a really nasty spot. I decided to suit up and go ride the trail, I was a bit nervous about the spot he was referring to but when I got there I soon saw that it really wasn't too bad. It could be a big accident waiting to happen but I never looked down when riding it and was able to get through it with no problems. The course was a blast to ride, it had a touch of everything except rough technical stuff. This course had so much flow to it, it started out with quite a bit of a rocky section (reminded me of Crowder) and then a short somewhat steep climb (had some rock in it) and then into nice flowy single track with gradual climbing. During the pre ride and the first couple laps I could hardly tell I was climbing (every lap after that I swear the hills got steeper and longer and 13 miles felt like 15 or 16). There was an aid station set up about half way through the course and once we reached that point most of the climbing was done, then it was back to flying through fast flowing single track....it was a hoot to ride. The last four miles was on a section called "Shadow Run", it started with a bit of climbing to the top and then some fast flowy single track along with some really tight and twisty single track that you could still carry a lot of speed through....fast and fun. Then the last mile was almost all down hill and it was screaming fast, there was one turn that I had to really watch my speed because it was a touch loose and I didn't want to go flying off the edge. Almost the whole down hill section had exposure on your left side so a bad line or if you got squirrely you were going to have a bad day. After the pre ride we started setting up our pit area, we were going to set up our camping tent to sleep in but with the rain in the forcast we opted to just put the air mattress in the back of the van since we didn't have any seats in the van, it worked out great. I guess we got a very small amount of rain Friday night into Saturday morning, about as much as a heavy dew. I might add that the ground was dusty dry there, we noticed on the drive in that most of the yards had burned up grass. Molly and I turned in early Friday night and got a pretty good nights sleep. Saturday morning early it was sunny and clear and then the gray clouds started to roll in and it was very cool out, I was nervous since the forecast was for rain, rain, rain. Around 7:30 it started to sprinkle and then came on a very heavy rain for about 8-10 minutes and then stopped but the sky was still gray and the threat of rain was still there. After about an hour the sky started to lighten up and finally the sun popped out, some people with internet on their phone said that the heavy rain split and went directly North and South of us.

Race start neared and the start of this race was a little unique, it had the typical lemans start but we had to take a part off of our bike and run with it and then once we reached our bike we could put it back together and take off. Soon we were all lined up and it was GO time!!!

I had no intention of running in fact I just did a light jog and was soon in the back of the pack, when I got to my bike I wasn't breathing hard at all but then I couldn't get my front wheel on. I started to panic but realized I needed to open the skewer a little more and it went right on. Starting out in the back of the pack was good because I wasn't caught up with fast riders pushing me to go harder than I should but tough because some of the riders I was behind were a little slower than I wanted to go. I slowly made my way up through the field when I could and finally got into a groove, maybe too fast. I almost backed off a bit but I was riding in second position of a train of about 5 or 6 riders and I would of had to stop and pull off to the side to let people around and I just couldn't do it. I never felt overworked during the first lap in fact it was a lot of fun, I kept the idea of 24 hours in the back of my mind and just tried to settle in to a nice pace.

I finished up the first lap, I pitted long enough to change bottles and say hi to Molly and then I was back out on another lap. Laps 1, 2, and 3 seemed to flow together really well, I was taking a few minutes for a break between laps and then about lap 4 I started to take a little longer for breaks. My back started hurting on lap two, which was a little discouraging, but then I remembered that I had the brain dialed as firm as it would go on my rear shock. I stopped and softened the rear suspension up it made a big difference on my back, the only bad thing is it made my pivots squeak a lot and it drove me nuts the whole time. I tried to shoot some lube into the pivots but I just couldn't get the squeak out of them, that was tough to deal with.

I don't remember exactly which lap it was but toward nightfall I started to get nasueous and let me tell you it is no fun to ride your bike when you feel like you are going to throw up, especially when you still have over 12 hours to ride your bike. The laps all seemed to run together so I don't remember which lap I went out with lights, I didn't use them until a little over half way through the lap, the next night lap I had a 12 hr solo rider come up behind me and he told me he didn't want around, he just wanted to ride my wheel if that was okay and it was fine with me. We talked for about half of the lap and then he backed off and I was all alone again. After that lap I decided it was time to take a longer break and put on some fresh clothes so I went and took a nice hot shower and put on my most comfortable bibs and a long sleeve jersey and it felt so good. I did one more lap and then decided to put on knee warmers, I left the pit with Mitch Johnson but he dropped me about 10 feet into the course. I came staggering in from that lap around 2:45 a.m. and decided I needed to lay down for a little bit. I had Molly set the alarm for about 1 hr and 50 min and we crawled into the van and I was out, when the alarm went off I had so many emotions flying through my head. I was so tired, sore, cold, my mental status was not at a normal level....a 24 hr race is brutal on the body but super brutal on your mind. I knew I needed to get up and ride but I think it was pure fear that kept me in the van, I had Molly set the alarm for 1 more hour and after a few minutes I was back asleep. When the alarm went off again I was not wanting to get out of that van, I was shivering inside the van, my legs and back were stiff, and I new my rear end was NOT going to like being put back on the saddle. I threw on a jacket and slowly took off, for the first 5 minutes I literally shifted every pedal stroke because my butt hurt so bad, I was dreading every climb and coasted wherever possible to save energy...needless to say it was a slow lap but the sun came up during that lap (that was a new experience for me). My next lap was pretty good, not blazing fast but pretty good and I took a good break after it as well, maybe too long. The next lap was my 11th lap and I took off like the start of the race and was feeling great for the first 2/3 of the lap and then I was wiped out again. When I came in Molly and Mitch J. said I could possibly get 4th place if I went back out, I didn't want to go back out but I wanted 4th place. We checked with the scoring tent to see if the current 4th place rider was out on course because he had finished his 11th lap at 4 something that morning but the scoring tent didn't know. We looked in the solo pit are for his bike number and couldn't find it so we didn't know if he was on course, or had left, or was pitted somewhere else in the park. I decided not to go back out because if he was on a lap the chances of my catching him (especially if he hadn't ridden since 4 a.m.) was not good, turns out he was done and I could have gotten 4th place. That is easy to say now since the race is over, I know I could have ridden another lap but it was going to be slow and painful (I had 2 hr and 8 min to complete the lap). I think one thing that made this race so hard (other than it was 24 hrs) was the fact that I felt like throwing up for more than half the race, I almost stopped on the trail and chugged my bottle and then was going to force myself to throw up to see if that would help. I wish I had gotten in more laps but 143 miles was still a great accomplishment and I am so pleased that I did this race. Mitch asked me afterwards if I was going to do another one and I told him I couldn't answer that question yet. One day later here I am and I can say that Yes I will do it again, I thought it would take several days before I would even consider it but it only took a few hours.

Below is a pic of Mitch "The Masher" Johnson, he is one heck of a bike rider and a super nice guy, I have gotten to know him this past year and I really enjoy being around him and the other St. Louis area riders. Mitch placed 3rd with 14 laps. Unfortuanately I don't have a pic of Todd Holtmann, who placed 2nd with 15 laps, but Todd is a lot of fun as well and obviously a great rider too.

Zach Brace finished 1st in the 12 hr solo with an amazing 10 laps. Greg Ott finished 3rd in the 12 hr solo with 9 laps. Todd Hecht finished 10th in the 12 hr solo with 7 laps. If you want to laugh and have a good time then Todd Hecht is the guy to hang out with!!!